Government plans to end inpatient care at Saginaw veterans hospital

http://www.freep.com/news/statewire/sw97386_20040506.htm

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The government will stop providing inpatient care at Saginaw's Lutz Veterans Medical Center by the end of the year, according to a plan obtained Thursday by The Associated Press.

The Veterans Affairs Department said it will continue to provide outpatient care and nursing home services at the facility, as well as a few hospital beds for patients who are waiting to be moved to other facilities.

The VA plans to provide services to veterans through contracts with local hospitals or by transferring them to other veterans hospitals in Detroit and Ann Arbor. The plan calls for a study to see whether additional beds are needed in Ann Arbor or if unused space should be opened in Detroit.

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"Eliminating inpatient care will have a devastating impact on the quality and access of medical care for veterans in mid-Michigan," said Peter Karafotas, a spokesman for Rep. Dale Kildee, D-Mich., whose district includes the hospital.

...more...

Kerry ought to be all over this like a duck on a June bug.

But what the hey, Michigan's already pretty much going Blue (in more ways than one), so what does Bush* care about its vets?

What did those veterans do for Bush? Oh yeah, put their lives on the line when he hid out in the Guard.....

much you support the troops.

The sheep Like the Chimp he is a Christian.

Dumbasses need to see this...Be interesting to see how they spin it.

they disgust me.

What's even worse is we just spent $20 or $30 million ten years ago to put a brand new long-term care wing onto the back of the Aleta Lutz (I think it's the only VA hospital named after a woman).
John
"Eliminating inpatient care will have a devastating impact on the quality and accest of medical care for veterans in mid-Michigan." Well, I know how well the government has ever taken care of its veterans, so I'll try to die as quietly and unobtrusively as possible.

This country tends cast off guilt by casting off her people.

Still, I come from a family of vets -- my nephew (currently in the USAF), brother, aunt, dad and a slew of granddads and uncles and so on all served just like I did.
It's never been a secret that the VA exists to let bureaucrats and politicians feel like they're actually holding up their end of the recruiting agreement they made with all of us.
If this country truly cared about its veterans, we'd be arguing in Congress about building more VA hospitals and clinics -- not fewer.
The old WWII guys are dying off, but the Korean War and baby-boomer Vietnam vets are getting older by the minute and we are all going to need more and more health care as we do.
The fact the Lutz is being shuttered just goes to show that "our" government has lied to us again. This should come as a shock to no one.
John
Not least the brand-new combat vets we're minting even as we speak.

It just breaks my heart..

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=04/05/06/149259

News reports and Pentagon briefings emerge daily announcing the death of U.S. soldiers in Iraq. But what is rarely heard in the U.S. media or from the Defense Department is the number of U.S. soldiers wounded.

Some figures that have been briefly mentioned in the press fall in the range of two to three thousand. But in a story that received little national attention, the Pentagon reported last month that the military made over 18,000 medical evacuations - representing 11,700 casualties in the first year of war in Iraq.

Couldn't get the whole document in print form. However, if you listen or watch this piece it becomes obvious that the injured are going to be much larger than ever seen before. Hope that the flag wavers remember this five and ten years down the road.